ST. AUGUSTINE, Fla. — It’s been over a year since the St. Johns County School District approved a new dress code policy for students. The district said it’s transitioned towards a gender-neutral style of dress code which gives students more opportunity to dress how they please, but parents are accusing the policy of targeting female students.
In the first week of the new school year, the St. Johns County School District reported 22 dress code violations district wide. It might not seem like a lot but 18 of those violations were by female students and only four were by male students.
“The problem with the dress code is that the enforcement of it is applied unfairly,” Parent Lily Bristow said.
When middle school parent Lily Bristow heard about the approval of a new dress code policy last August, she said she was relieved there would no longer be different dress code policy sections for boys and girls and measurement requirements for shorts, skirts and dresses were removed.
”I thought this was a great, you know, a great step for you know awareness,” Bristow said.
But this year she said her daughter's school has made it clear it’s cracking down on dress code violations. She said this only means one thing.
“When the conversation is, you know, we're cracking down on dress code, they're not talking to the boys, they're talking to the girls,” Bristow said.
But Senior Director for School Services Paul Abbatinozzi said principals do have the authority to alter dress code requirements as necessary but enforcement will focus on positive guidance without embarrassment.
“We moved to a mid thigh measurement for the fact that students do have different body types so we think we are being very receptive to that. We support that it is important to have standards within our school district and dress is one of those. We don't see it to be unreasonable but we do have students follow the standard of appropriate dress,” Senior Director for School Services Paul Abbatinozzi said.
Bristow said she doesn’t agree with enforcing a dress code but appreciates the district’s hard work in improving the policy.
“I know, probably the majority of people would not agree with me on that. I just don't think I just don't think it's important for what we're trying to do, which is educate our kids,” Bristow said.
St. Johns County School District reported 465 dress code violations last school year and Abbatinozzi said that really only represents less than 1% of the student population. He said the district will continue to strive to be fair, consistent, and reinforce positive guidance to students this school year.